The habit of daily task management is one that can make all the difference in terms of personal effectiveness. Effective individuals, of course, make up effective teams. Effective teams can generate more profit, raise their productivity and impress their customers with systematic excellence.
I want to share with you a few of the tools in PDCA Complete that can make this process so much easier. If you want the results I’ve just outlined, keep reading!
One – Make this a start of the day habit
If you want to make this part of your normal working day, you need to start with it. Trying to do this at the end of the working day won’t cut it. By the time you get around to it, you’ll be tired and not in the right frame of mind to manage your obligations.
Even a few minutes at the start of the day can make this approach work.
Two – Slice and dice your tasks
There are a number of ways you can cut up your task list. The key point, however, is that cutting up your to do list you’ll make it appear in bite size chunks. Massive, long, lists are overwhelming. Small lists appear manageable. Manageable lists have a better chance of getting done.
In PDCA Complete we have a central screen for actions called the My Tasks page. This allows you to use filters and search functions to give you a list that makes sense for you. If you want to see the tasks you need to complete, that’s one filter. If you need to see what your team are working on, that’s another filter. If you want to see the tasks that you need to approve and sign off, that’s another.
Three – Prioritize your tasks.
Whether you do this by an official priority rating, due date or a gut feel, you need to prioritize.
Decide what you need to tackle first from your smaller list of tasks and commit.
Four – Take action
Logically, taking action is essential. If you want a smaller to do list and the results from the actions, you need to get your teeth into the task in hand.
Within PDCA Complete we have a notes function to capture any information that supports the completion of the task (which is great if the task is going to take more than one day to close out).
We also have a stakeholder feature in our tasks, so you can add others into the conversation, whilst a tasks is being worked on. Insights, information and opinion can be gathered to ensure an effective completion of the task.
Five – Repeat
Once you have completed your tasks, repeat this process over and over again.
PDCA Complete also has features to help you with your tasks. An inbuilt prioritization system, auditing tools and digital workflows, to name just some of them.
Free account
We offer a free account for up to three team members. You can claim your free account here.
If you want to upgrade your account, you can do so at anytime. Information on the upgrade costs are here.
PDCA Complete really does come to life when you get your whole team onboard.
In the meantime, I hope you start to slice and dice your to do lists and watch as your effectiveness increases.
